Hi Julianna - Of COURSE I'm interested in what you're growing! This "bright shade" situation is most interesting and will require experimenting. I started this thread LESS than a month ago and already I see a difference in the number of hours the back of my balconies get sun. On the same token, the sun spots for the items hanging off the balcony are also lengthening. Right now, due to the containers I used for most of my succulents being bulky, they've been placed to the back of my patio where they get a brightness all day long (bright shade, as you called it) but direct sun is for but an hour plus a day? I have to wait and see how these do moving forward... This is balcony 1 -- the one with full sun up front. I bought a bunch of those white balcony pot hanging thingamagics -- and it's pretty useful. It's smaller than balcony 2, but deeper. What's not shown is that further in to the left, you have two shelves full of plants--where most of the succulents are as well as my infamous gardenia, which Purple has been helping me with, haha. This was taken moments ago and today is a bit stormy and cloudy but it's still bright out there at 3:30 pm. This is balcony 2. It's significantly wider with about 3-4 feet MORE to the left than is shown here; that part is obviously full shade. The remainder is all less full sun than balcony 1 and in the afternoon, it quickly goes into no sun as to the right of this balcony, the building juts out with an overhang to the lobby area below. That seems to block out the sun instantly. Unlike you, my area requires me to bring in virtually nothing as we rarely hit 40* and if a plant's lowest tolerance is 50* (which is basically our entire winter) -- then either I don't get it, or it evolves quickly, haha. Thank God, because my house is full enough with houseplants -- I need outside plants to come in like I need a hole in the head. I was browsing some ferns yesterday! Are they hard to grow? I have a Venus Maidenhair here inside, but I don't believe I've ever had ferns in my yard. In the past when I had homes, I've usually had full sun and have much, much less experience with shade plants. I'm messing with the idea of hostas and I'm definitely getting some coleus and begonias, but on balcony 2 - where most of my shade gardening would be -- you can see that the depth of the balcony is minimal; putting large pots out there means no walking area. This puts a damper in my idea of creating cascading containers w/ spillers, etc. I might have room for... uh, ONE. After all of this, I'm of the mindset to move back to a house, haha. I find myself driving around town and looking at homes to figure out, "Is that yard facing south? No, wait...east?" It's sad, really!! Your post is missing photos. I'd love to see!!!!!!!!!!!! -Grace.

If you are worried about critters install chicken wire barried around foundation about 8" deep. The top edge of the wire should be covered by the floor. I would lay down weed barrier first, no matter what the floor covering. No weeds! If you are worried about too much heat in the summer the best and cheapest bet is to make your poly easily removable. The less poly the more air circulation. Without knowing how your structure is configured I can't tell you if seasonal poly removal will be easy for you or not. It does beat paying fot electricity for fans. The panels can be replaced with framed screens. Pretty easty to make yourself to size.

Here's a list of things that may/could have made things worse: Have you switched detergents? Use only good quality dw detergent with enzymes such as Electrasol tabs, Cascade gel packs. Is the water going into your dishwasher hot enough? Have you turned down your water heater? If you have a cake thermometer I would check how hot the water is coming out of the kitchen faucet. However many dishwashers have a water heating element so it's possible that the heating element in the dishwasher isn't working and the intial hot water going into the machine is cooling off, especially after the first rinse cycle, the second flow of water into the machine may not be hot enough.. Check the temperature of the water inside the dishwasher with the cake thermometer midway thru the wash cycle.

Most of my citrus get only about 4 to 6 hours of sun in summer. I don't usually have them in full all-day sun. They seem to grow better in pots for me this way. For my situation the pots would overheat too much in all-day full sun. And I've never had a problem with blooming and fruit production. Usually they start blooming before I even set them out. I start them out in shade in spring and gradually -- over a period of 3 weeks -- move them to more sun. I do this because usually they have a lot of tender new growth before I even set them out. Actually toward September/October I do move them to as sunny and protected spot as possible because I want to make the most of the shorter and cooler days. Also want fruit to ripen.